The Best Years of Our Lives (1946)

Re-evaluating my perceptions of post-war
life after seeing
The Best Years of Our Lives

by Elizabeth, ReelClassics.com

April 10, 1996

The following is a paper I wrote for my English course on War
Literature during my senior year in high school, after I first saw the film The
Best Years of Our Lives.

Because I was born in 1977 instead of 1937 or 1957, I have relatively
little first hand experience with war. By the time I came around, the World
Wars were over. Korea was over. Vietnam was over. Even the Cold War had
dwindled down to insults. As a result, what I have learned about war has
been from the stories my grandfathers and uncles told, the facts, dates
and main characters I have read about in various history classes at school,
and the movies I have watched. However, it was not until spring break of
this year that a certain aspect of war and the poignant problems it implied
were called to my attention. Everyone has heard of the typical horrors
of war -- blood and guts, losing friends, hunger and filth, monotony and
boredom, anxiety and stress, death and destruction -- but few people consider
how difficult it is, not only to fight in a war, but to stop fighting;
few people consider how hard it is to come home.

Over spring break, I watched a movie that I had recorded several
weeks earlier entitled, The Best Years of Our Lives. It was made
in 1946 and starred Fredric March,
Myrna Loy, Dana
Andrews, and Virginia Mayo. I had recorded it, however, because it
also starred Teresa Wright,
a young (early twenties) actress who made many films during the 1940's
including one of my favorite World War II films, Mrs. Miniver (1942).
Because I had recorded it on the basis of Teresa
Wright's acting reputation, I really had no idea what the film was
about or if it would be any good. All I knew was that it was close to three
hours long and would require a substantial period of time lacking in NCAA
basketball action on TV to get it watched uninterrupted. When I did get
the chance, however, I discovered what a great movie it actually was, and
I realized (as I learned after looking it up) why it had won seven Academy
Awards, including Best Picture of 1946.

The Best Years of Our Lives is the story of three service
men who return to their home town after World War II. One, who served in
the infantry, is a banker, married for over twenty years with two late-teenage
children. The second, who was a pilot, is a soda jerk who married a girl
he hardly knew about two weeks before he left. The third and youngest,
a sailor, had just proposed to his high school sweetheart via letters home
when he had his hands burned off in an explosion. He is now reconsidering
his proposal, not knowing how his family or his girlfriend will react toward
his new hooks. The movie follows these servicemen from their anxieties
on the trip home, through their arrival and the trials of readjustment
to civilian life. Though I had seen several war movies of this era, ranging
from battle movies, to love stories, to outright pro-war propaganda films
and news reels, I had never seen a war movie about life after the war.
I had always thought, "The boys are coming home! Strike up the band!
Prepare the ticker-tape parade! Then everyone will be happy and things
will go on just as if the war had never happened." After all, the
United States didn't suffer much at all compared to many other nations.
We experienced many fewer casualties and almost no homeland destruction
for which to mourn and rebuild. It seemed natural that when the confetti
was swept up and the band went home, things would return to normal. But,
as The Best Years of Our Lives showed me, this was not necessarily
the case.

I had never considered before what a strain it could put on a marriage,
even an established marriage, to separate the couple for the duration of
a war -- not just a few weeks, or even a month or two, but years -- two or
three or four whole years without seeing one another. People change over
time, especially during a war. And, as opposed to the changes a married
couple experiences together during peace time, changes during times of
war are experienced separately and are therefore dealt with separately,
creating a great potential for a couple to grow apart whereas otherwise,
they might have grown closer together.

A similar situation exists with the separation of a parent and a
child. Especially when they are younger, but even when they reach the double
digits, children grow very quickly. They physically look different to a
returning parent who has not seen them in a few years, but they also act
different as they have begun (or continued) to develop into individuals,
more mature and self-sufficient. From the child's point of view, it is
also very difficult to suddenly have someone around the house and part
of your everyday life who for many yesterdays simply wasn't there, and
today, seems almost like a stranger because both have changed in his absence.

Another problem I had never considered was the individual pressure
of finding a satisfactory job after being a serviceman for so long. Suddenly,
a desk job reading loan applications seems very dull and pointless, being
a soda jerk after flying fighter planes doesn't seem very worthwhile, and
finding a job performable by someone with a physical handicap seems next
to impossible. Furthermore, with post-war production cutbacks and war-time
employees already in place, even an equivalent job to the one previously
held could be hard to find.

Finally, I realized that The Best Years of Our Lives dealt
only with these and many other problems as they pertained to the lives
and families of returning servicemen. What about those whose loved
ones never returned? Though it was difficult for many of the families to
readjust, having their relatives back after such a long absence, it must
have been especially hard for those families who now had to deal with the
permanence of that once-thought temporary absence. On the other hand, it
is probable that many had prepared themselves for this possible outcome
to war, and were less prepared for the extenuating trials of life when
the loved one did return -- for the relationship strains, the restlessness,
the flashbacks, the disappointment that the world did not wait for them,
and the changes in character. I guess determining which would be harder
to deal with depends on the specific circumstances.

Despite its length, I watched this movie three times over spring
break because it was so thought provoking. Every time I watched it, I found
myself considering aspects of war and life after war I had never thought
about before. And, though it ends happily as most movies of this era do,
I still came away with the understanding that post-war life wasn't simply
a big party and then back to the same old song. Even endings that seem
to be storybook happily-ever-afters, upon closer examination
can reveal unhappy realities that question the conceptions previously held
on the subject. Certainly The Best Years of Our Lives forced me to
re-evaluate my image of life after World War II.